How the NSA Hacks Cellphone Networks Worldwide

Ryan Gallagher, writing for The Intercept, has published a story outlining some processes that the National Security Agency (NSA) uses to “find security weaknesses in cellphone technology that it can exploit for surveillance.” The operation, codenamed AURORAGOLD, involved monitoring the trade group primarily responsible for developing mobile communications standards and security processes. Moreover, the NSA has monitored individuals and organizations responsible for establishing and operating cellphone networks; this has involved “maintaining a list of 1,201 email ‘selectors’ used to intercept internal company details from employees” of such organizations. This surveillance has enabled the NSA to collect technical information on “about 70 percent of cellphone networks worldwide” though knowledge of these networks may not necessarily be correlated with the discovery of vulnerabilities in all cellphone networks.